“Miracles for Sale”

INTRO: I heard and old story recently, an illustration really, that I had heard before many years back. One of those old stories that have been around so long people say they have whiskers.
There was a young Indian who was hunting on the mountains when he came across a wise old teacher. “How can I find God”? The young Indian asked. “I'll show you,” said the teacher, “if you'll come down to the river with me.” When they got to the waters edge, the wise old man took the young Indian by the hand and led him into the deepest part of the river. Then he deliberately dunked the young Indian under the water. Despite the young Indian kicking and punching, the old man held his head under the water for a full minute. When he finally allowed the young Indian to stand upright sputtering for air, he said, “Young man, when you want to find God as much as you wanted air just then, you will find Him, no problem.”

The point is, many people today don’t want to make any effort to find God, they are like the Pharisees of old, and they just look for signs. We are living in an age where people claim the miracles, signs and wonders like those we find recorded in the Bible are still happening. Today I’d like to take a look at that.

I. Belief in Miracles I’d like to begin by asking you all this question, do you believe in the miraculous events written within the Scriptures?

a. You see, some people don’t believe in miracles so they try to explain away the miracle by suggesting it was some natural force of nature which took place.
b. But do you believe in the miraculous events which we find recorded within the Bible?

i. For example do you believe that God opened up the river Jordan so that His people could walk through on dry land to get to His promised land?
ii. Do you believe that Jesus walked on water?

c. While you are thinking on that let me ask you what was the first recorded miracle in the Bible?

i. You might say it was during the time of Moses when God freed His people from the Egyptians.
ii. You might even say it was Abraham’s wife, Sarah who became pregnant at an old age.

d. But let me share with you the first recorded miracle in the Bible. It happened during a time when there was nothing, there was no time, no people, and no earth. We find the first recording of a miracle in Genesis 1:1 where it says, In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.
e. People will immediately say that the earth was formed accidentally from what they call ‘the big bang theory’. Then they go on to explain we all started as something else and just evolved into humans. We are all just accidents.
f. Genesis 1:1 says, that “...God created the heaven and the earth.” Genesis tells us that creation was a miracle.

i. When God created man, the Bible says in Genesis 2:7, “The lord God formed the man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being.” God made man from dust, He breathed the breath of life into the man, and so Genesis tells us that’s a miracle.
ii. If you believe in the Genesis account of creation, you shouldn’t have any trouble believing the rest of the miracles recorded within the Bible.

g. But there are people who do not believe in biblical miracles and you know what amazes me? When Christians say “Well, I’m just not sure if Jesus really did raise Lazarus from the dead, a coma perhaps?” “I’m not sure if Jesus actually did turn that water into wine.”

i. It amazes me because as Christians we have a supernatural God who can command, “Let there be light” and there was light. We have a supernatural God who can say, “Let the earth bring forth grass, the herb yielding seed, and the fruit tree yielding fruit after his kind, whose seed is in itself, upon the earth: and it was so.”.
ii. Yet there are Christians who say, “I believe He created everything but I just can’t believe our God could stop the sun in its tracks for a day.” Why shouldn’t the One who created the sun be able to stop it, why could He not help the Israelites win a war?
iii. Why do we doubt the One who created the water is able to walk on it?
iv. Why can’t we believe the One who gives life is able to take it back?

h. It’s not a matter of the believing in the miraculous is it folks? It’s a matter of faith in the One who is able to do the miraculous.

II. The Purpose of Miracles That brings me to my next question, what was the purpose of miracles, signs and wonders?

a. The peacock is one of the most beautiful birds on the earth today. What he does when he is interested in a female, is open up his feathers and display all those beautiful colors. Why does he do that? He’s trying to get the females attention. That was one of the reasons why God performed miracles; God was trying to get people’s attention.
b. Remember when Moses and Aaron went to Pharaoh to tell him to let His people go? In Exodus 7:10-12 it says, “And Moses and Aaron went in unto Pharaoh, and they did so as the Lord had commanded: and Aaron cast down his rod before Pharaoh, and before his servants, and it became a serpent. Then Pharaoh also called the wise men and the sorcerers: now the magicians of Egypt, they also did in like manner with their enchantments. For they cast down every man his rod, and they became serpents: but Aaron's rod swallowed up their rods.”
c. Notice Pharaoh wasn’t all that impressed with Moses and Aaron and so he didn’t pay much attention to the miracle but when Aaron’s staff swallowed Pharaoh’s magician’s staffs, they should have noticed and paid attention.
d. Because of Pharaoh’s stubborn heart, he ignored that sign at his own cost. God went ahead and preformed other miracles.
e. What was the point of all these miracles? The Egyptians loved to have their gods, in fact they had a god for almost anything that breathed or moved.

i. They thought the Nile was a god, but God turned the Nile into blood, they thought that frogs, gnats, flies, were gods. They worshipped all kinds of livestock, they had gods for the weather, the sun and the moon so on.
ii. God with His miracles was showing them that He was greater than all their so-called gods and Pharaoh needed to listen to Him. A miracle was undeniable, it was divine proof that the supernatural had occurred.

f. When God performed these miracles, signs and wonders through someone He chose, they were performed to prove to the people that the message, which went along with the miracle, was from God Himself.
g. You see the miracles were to be a sign, so that people would pay attention and then believe the message. In Exodus 4:8 the Lord said to Moses, “And it shall come to pass, if they will not believe thee, neither hearken to the voice of the first sign, that they will believe the voice of the latter sign.” Pharaoh didn’t believe and Pharaoh’s magicians couldn’t match Moses’ God.
h. Fast-forward a few years to the time of Jesus, why did Jesus perform miracles, signs and wonders? Let’s ask God through His word.

i. John tells us in John 20:30-31 “And many other signs truly did Jesus in the presence of his disciples, which are not written in this book: But these are written, that ye might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God; and that believing ye might have life through his name.”
ii. Jesus performed miracles not just for the benefit of the people who were being healed but to bring about their faith.

i. Remember when Jesus was about to raise Lazarus back to life? Jesus said in John 11:41-42 “Father, I thank thee that thou hast heard me. And I knew that thou hearest me always: but because of the people which stand by I said it, that they may believe that thou hast sent me.”
j. He performed miracles to show as a sign that He was the Christ, He was the promised Messiah, He was God in the flesh, He is the Truth and His words were sure and trustworthy. That’s why after Jesus ascended to heaven, Peter said in Acts 2:22 “Ye men of Israel, hear these words; Jesus of Nazareth, a man approved of God among you by miracles and wonders and signs, which God did by him in the midst of you, as ye yourselves also know:”
k. Hence the Hebrew writer says in Hebrews 2:3-4 “How shall we escape if we ignore such a great salvation? This salvation, which was first announced by the Lord, was confirmed to us by those who heard him. God also testified to it by signs, wonders and various miracles, and gifts of the Holy Spirit distributed according to his will.”
l. The miracles performed by Jesus were a sign to the people that He was God and His message was true. These miracles of the New Testament served for the divine purpose of confirmation.
m. So miracles were to get peoples attention and to prove who Christ was. Miracles, signs and wonders also were for the divine purpose of backing up the message.

i. Mark tells us in Mark 16:20 “Then the disciples went out and preached everywhere, and the Lord worked with them and confirmed his word by the signs that accompanied it.”
ii. And again when Peter and John were before the Sanhedrin we find them praying to God and they said in Acts 4:29-30 “Now, Lord, consider their threats and enable your servants to speak your word with great boldness. Stretch out your hand to heal and perform miraculous signs and wonders through the name of your holy servant Jesus.”

n. Why did they ask to be able to perform, miraculous signs and wonders? To prove that their message was legitimate, the miracles were performed to back up the message.
o. How do we today know whether what someone is preaching or teaching is true or not? We would like the Bereans in Acts 17:11 and read the scriptures, the Bible, for ourselves. During New Testament times they never had the complete written Word like we have it today but they did have the Old Testament scripture.
p. They didn’t have the Bible readily available like we have today because it wasn’t written yet. They couldn’t check out their Bibles like we do today to see if someone has taken something out of context or preaching something false.

III. Miracles. That’s what all the miracles, signs and wonders were building up to. They were building up to the complete, revealed Word of God in the form of the Bible.

a. There was a link between the miraculous and the preached word. Look with me at;
b. Acts 14:1-3 “1. And it came to pass in Iconium, that they went both together into the synagogue of the Jews, and so spake, that a great multitude both of the Jews and also of the Greeks believed. But the unbelieving Jews stirred up the Gentiles, and made their minds evil affected against the brethren. Long time therefore abode they speaking boldly in the Lord, which gave testimony unto the word of his grace, and granted signs and wonders to be done by their hands.”
c. I want you to notice again how the message was confirmed when God enabled the apostles to do miraculous signs and wonders. Paul said in Romans 15:18-19 “For I will not dare to speak of any of those things which Christ hath not wrought by me, to make the Gentiles obedient, by word and deed, Through mighty signs and wonders, by the power of the Spirit of God; so that from Jerusalem, and round about unto Illyricum, I have fully preached the gospel of Christ.”
d. The miracles of the New Testament legitimized the teaching of God’s messengers as compared to the many false teachers that attempted to fool people.

i. Like Simon in Acts 8. Here is a man called Simon, who was a sorcerer, he was well respected and claimed to have divine power but he didn’t. He became a Christian and followed Philip, but he didn’t become a Christian for the right reasons, Acts 8:13 says, “Then Simon himself believed also: and when he was baptized, he continued with Philip, and wondered, beholding the miracles and signs which were done.”
ii. Here was a man who became a Christian because he wanted the supernatural powers the apostles had but he wanted the power much more than he wanted Christ, in fact he was even willing to pay for that ability.
iii. Peter tells Simon in Acts 8:20-21 “But Peter said unto him, Thy money perish with thee, because thou hast thought that the gift of God may be purchased with money. Thou hast neither part nor lot in this matter: for thy heart is not right in the sight of God.”

e. Simon thought these miraculous gifts were for sale. My point is many people went around performing tricks and preaching all sorts of things to anyone who would listen to them so they would have followers.
f. When God performed a miracle through his people, those seeing it had absolutely no doubt that a real miracle had been performed and they could trust the message that was being preached. People knew this wasn’t a natural event, which had occurred, it was supernatural. People weren’t left thinking, “How did they do that?” They knew that God was the One who enabled these men to perform these miracles.
g. They knew and that’s why when Nicodemus approached Jesus during the night he said to Him in John 3:2 “Rabbi, we know that thou art a teacher come from God: for no man can do these miracles that thou doest, except God be with him.”
h. Nicodemus knew that God was with Jesus, because there was no other explanation for the miracles Jesus performed. People knew that God had to be with the apostles, because there was no other explanation for the miracles.

IV. The Messenger. So miracles also served the purpose to prove that God was with the ones proclaiming His message, and also they served to reveal His will for mankind. Every time there was a miracle, people weren’t just astonished at the miracle, God was revealing more and more of His nature to mankind.

a. When He created the universe and everything in it, He showed us that He wanted nothing but the best place for us to live.
b. When He created man in His image, He wanted to let us know that we are special to Him and we are His people and He wants to have personal fellowship with us.
c. When He parted the Red Sea, He wanted to tell His people that He is a mighty, redeeming God.
d. When He healed the sick, He wanted His people to know that He cares for them.
e. When He promised His Holy Spirit, He was telling us that He doesn’t want to dwell among His people anymore but wants to dwell in them.
f. When He went to Calvary and died on the cross, He told us how deeply He loves us.
g. When He talks about a day of judgment, He is telling us that He is a God of justice.
h. God revealed His character and will, until what He wants us to know of His character and will were totally revealed in the form of the Bible.

V. Today. Please turn your Bibles to 1 Corinthians 12. There is no arguing that the 1st century church had miraculous gifts. There’s no denying that because the Bible clearly tells us they had these gifts. But I think now that we have a good understanding why God enabled men to perform miracles, signs and wonders. We should have no trouble in understanding why these gifts are not needed today.

a. Looking at 1 Corinthians 12 remember that the church that meets in Corinth is a very young church, very immature and full of division. In 1 Corinthians 12:4-7 Paul says, (paraphrased) “There are different kinds of gifts, but the same Spirit. There are different kinds of service, but the same Lord. There are different kinds of working, but the same God works all of them in all men. Now to each one, the manifestation of the Spirit is given for the common good.”
b. Paul goes on to describe the different gifts that each one has. But what Paul is doing in 1 Corinthians 12, is arguing that the body, the church, should function harmoniously by using their miraculous gifts properly. Paul addresses that issue because some were saying their gift was better than someone else’s gift... my gift is superior to your gift.

i. Much like children when it comes to Christmas time, they love their gifts and when they meet up with their friends they start boasting about who has the best gift.
ii. The church in Corinth were very much acting like children with the gifts they received from God.
iii. That’s why Paul goes on to say in 1 Corinthians 13 that love is a more excellent gift than any miraculous gifts. Perspective.

c. All right then why? Why is love better than all these gifts? Paul tells us in 1 Corinthians 13:4-8 again I’ll paraphrase “Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails. Now listen. But where there are prophecies, they will cease; where there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is knowledge, it will pass away.”
d. Paul is saying listen, love is better because all these miraculous gifts, like prophecy, and tongue speaking and supernatural knowledge. These were going to fail, cease, vanish and be done away with. Paul says they are not going to be around for much longer.
e. Ok, we know love is better, but why then are these gifts going to pass away? Why aren’t they going to be around much longer Paul?
f. Paul continues now and tells us in 1 Corinthians 13:9-10 “For we know in part and we prophesy in part, but when perfection comes, the imperfect disappears.” In other words these gifts provide an incomplete or partial portrait of Christianity. Where Paul says, “For we know in part and we prophesy in part.” He’s talking about those miraculous gifts. He’s saying that the church only possessed bits and pieces of God’s will.

i. They received a little bit of God’s will when someone prophesied, they got another little bit of God’s will when someone spoke in tongues and they got another little bit of God’s will when someone told the supernatural knowledge revealed to them by God.
ii. Remember we are dealing with the will of God being revealed here. They didn’t get these gifts to show off, they were to back up the message they preached, which revealed a little more about our God. If they only knew in part the will of God, if they only prophesied in part, when was that going to come to an end?

g. Paul tells us in 1 Corinthians 13:9-10 “For we know in part and we prophesy in part, but when perfection comes, the imperfect disappears.” In other words the “In part” would end, when the “Perfect” came. So now we need to ask the question, what is the “Perfect”?
h. Some people like to believe the perfect mentioned here is talking about Jesus. The KJV says ‘but when that which is perfect is come.’ Something does not seem right, Jesus is never described as an ‘it’ or a ‘that’. Those who have been studying awhile will probably remember that the word here translated as “perfect” is the word teleios (tel’-ei-os) and it means complete or a full-grown thing.
i. The perfect then is the complete, revealed scriptures, the Bible. That same complete, inspired Word of God, which helps us to become Christ-like and mature.

i. The Bible says in 1 Peter 2:2, something like this “Like new born babies, crave pure spiritual milk, so that by it, you may grow up in your salvation”. And in 2 Peter 3:18 we read, “Grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and savior Jesus Christ”.
ii. When the church only possessed bits and pieces of God’s will as revealed through scattered miraculous gifts, the church or body as Paul calls it was not mature. It was still in its infancy, still a baby.
iii. Paul had already told them that back in 1 Corinthians 3:1-2, when he said to them, “Brothers, I could not address you as spiritual but as worldly, mere infants in Christ, I gave you milk not solid food for you were not ready for it, indeed you are still not ready”.
iv. Because they weren’t mature or could not mature as Christians, Paul says you are still like children. Paul said to the Christians in Corinth in 1 Corinthians 13:11 “When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child.”

j. And when God’s will had been revealed, the church then had the means available to be a man and grow up. Paul goes on to say in 1 Corinthians 13:11 “When I became a man, I put childish ways behind me.”
k. Sort of like when I take a shower the bathroom gets all steamed up and then when I go to shave, I can’t see all of my face, I can only see parts of my face and it’s really difficult to shave. For me to see my face clearly I need to clear away the steam off the mirror.
l. Paul uses as an illustration in 1 Corinthians 13:12 where he says, “Now we see but a poor reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.”
m. In other words the existence of the miraculous gifts to acquire God’s Word is compared to looking through a clouded mirror. Once the complete New Testament was available in written form, the miraculous gifts were no longer necessary. Paul says it was like standing face to face with someone, rather than looking through a clouded mirror.
n. Now all are able to see clearly, and now everyone is able to know the full will of God. We have no excuse to remain spiritual babies in Christ. We have the written Word of God and when we study it and apply it to our lives, we can grow up in Christ and become mature.
o. Paul says the same thing in Ephesians 4:11-15 where he says, “And he gave some, apostles; and some, prophets; and some, evangelists; and some, pastors and teachers; For the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ: Till we all come in the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ: That we henceforth be no more children, tossed to and fro, and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the sleight of men, and cunning craftiness, whereby they lie in wait to deceive; But speaking the truth in love, may grow up into him in all things, which is the head, even Christ:”
p. When were we all going to reach unity in THE faith? Well remember the word faith here doesn’t mean belief, it means the entire teaching and words we find within the Scriptures. Now the complete Bible was available and we can all grow as we read the Bible. So now no one has got any excuse not to grow, because the Bible is readily available and all Christians have the potential to grow up and become mature spiritually.

CLOSE: A preacher once explained these miraculous gifts to me like this, and I hope this helps your understanding of the subject. When you see a building being built you will see it starting off with its foundation and as it starts to grow, the builders usually erect temporary scaffolding around it, both to keep it steady and so that they can work on it.
These miraculous gifts in the 1st century church were like scaffolding that was temporally erected while the superstructure was being built. And what do you do with the scaffolding when the building work is finished? You remove it and take it away because its job is done; it’s served its purpose. Once the structure is complete the scaffolding is removed and discarded.
The miraculous gifts were only temporary, they were to help build up the church, until the Bible was readily available to everyone. John tells us in Revelation 22:18-19 “I warn everyone who hears the words of the prophecy of this book: If anyone adds anything to them, God will add to him the plagues described in this book. And if anyone takes words away from this book of prophecy, God will take away from him his share in the tree of life and in the holy city, which are described in this book.”
There are many who do not grasp this concept and they need to heed the words of Matthew 24:24 “For there shall arise false Christs, and false prophets, and shall shew great signs and wonders; insomuch that, if it were possible, they shall deceive the very elect.” There are people like that in the world today, people who try to deceive for gain. I’d like to tell you of the famous British illusionist, mentalist, trickster, hypnotist, painter, writer, and sceptic, Derren Brown, who did a TV program called, ‘Miracles for sale’. To describe it quickly, in this program he selected one man “off the street” so to speak and trained him to be a preacher and faith healer within a number of weeks. He took him to America, trained him some more, set him up with an audience and the man performed the miraculous in the form of healing. His audience was so in awe of him that they were praising God for him and what he had done. The man became very uneasy about deceiving people so at the end he announced that he didn’t want their money, he told them he was a Christian but the miracles he had just done were fake.

Today faith healing is a multi-billion dollar industry and what Brown did was try to bring the falseness of it to his audience’s attention. But folks, we have the complete will of God available today, we don’t need any signs to confirm His Word because we already have His complete Word.

We don’t need wonders to understand our God because we can read about how wondrous He is in His Word. We don’t need to speak in a so-called tongue to show people we are spiritual, because the Bible tells us that we are in Christ and we reign with Him in the heavenly realms, you can’t get any more spiritual than that.

We have no excuse to remain spiritual babies because His Word helps us to become mature Christians. Even if you’re not a Christian today, you still have no excuse for not knowing His will for you. All you have to do is want to find God.
And what is His will for you? 2 Peter 3:9 “The Lord is not slow in keeping his promise, as some understand slowness. He is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance.”

Now all these gifts have gone, what do we have left? Paul tells us in 1 Corinthians 13:13 “And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.”

We learn from the New Testament how to be saved. Romans 10:17 tells us to hear the word; Mark 16:16 teaches us that we must believe in Jesus; Acts 2:38 instructs us to repent of our sins; we must confess our belief that Jesus is the Son of God like the Eunuch did in Acts chapter 8; in Acts 2:38 Peter tells us we are to be baptized for the remission of our sins. If we follow these steps, the Lord adds us to His church where we strive to live as He has instructed us, to daily take up our cross and follow Him.
Perhaps you are in the assembly today and your need is to be buried with Christ in baptism. The beginning of your discipleship is a decision and an action. If you have never done these things, we urge you to do so today. If anyone has this need or desires the prayers of faithful Christians on their behalf, they are welcome to come forward while we stand and sing.